Playing with water beads

It wasn't until recently that I even knew these existed. I first saw them on You'll Thank Me One Day. Hers took several hours after adding them to water to plump up; the ones I bought were ready to go. You can find them in the floral section at your local craft store - I got these at Michael's with a 40% off coupon for around $3. The great thing about them is I can store them in the container they came in until next time. I think they will last for a while.

My daughter Lou was actually the one to talk me into getting them. She saw them on the shelf and was practically begging me to get them. I don't know if it was the colors she liked or if she actually knew what they were. I don't know how she would know, but she claimed she did.

They are awesome - completely squishy, slippery and bouncy {they are a polymer just like GAK}

After running her fingers through them few times, Lou decided to get out some tongs and play that way.

Well, one kitchen utensil turned into many...I actually had to draw the line because I didn't want to have to wash every kitchen utensil that we owned after they were done playing.

Maisy immediately wanted to add some marbles into the mix since they looked very similar to the water beads. Of course the marbles gave exactly the opposite sensory experience than the water beads - very hard vs. soft and squishy.

She had to try a bunch of different utensils as well.

I had to split up the water beads between the three girls - you can see here that Maisy has plenty to work with, but she really spent most of her time running after the strays that were bouncing around on the floor. She never could get quite enough. I wish she would have played with them more instead of worrying about what the others had - I guess that's part of the middle child syndrome.

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Mina loved to stir her beads around. In fact all the girls love to toss their make-believe salad.

Since Maisy was adding marbles to her "salad", Mina decided she should add a Squinkie or two.

The problem I had with Mina and the beads was that she started to try and eat them. They are definitely not for consumption, I ended up taking hers away because she wouldn't stop putting them in her mouth. Needless to say, she was not happy about that.